Voltaic Key Discussion

1 week ago

Any infinite turn deck really should run white for Grand Abolisher. Then you can happily take turn after turn after turn, eventually assembling a winning combo. Or just run Laboratory Maniac and mill yourself one turn at a time.

Blue should give you sufficient card draw to safely avoid using too many tutors. You can probably get by with just the blue artifact-only tutors or Enlightened Tutor (presuming you have cantrips).

1 week ago

So I recently had the idea to pair Amulet of Vigor with Time Vault to get an immediate extra turn. I want to build a deck around this idea so I need your help Brainstorming some cards. It'll have to be Vintage, I suppose, but I might just make it a conceptual casual deck. I was thinking of running various shock-lands so I'll always have them untapped with Amulet of Vigor or just shock myself if I don't. I'll need tutor spells, of course, and a way to make the combo infinite, maybe with Voltaic Key. Color is regardless, though I was thinking of running blue for Trinkit Mage and counterspells and black for tutors and such. What do you think, any suggestions for cards to make this work and cards that benefit from entering untapped?

1 week ago

WalkingIllusion The infect stuff was based on the idea that I can use recurrsion to keep using them to drop infect counters on people and the creatures could just walk in. But I did pull all but Inkmoth nexus (because I can use it with hatred to instakill a player if needed) and a Phyrexian Juggernaut (which would work sweet with Blade of Selves and the Mirage Mirror to take out multiple people at once). Blightsteel Colossus is listed but I'm actually running the Darksteel Colossus instead because Blightsteel colossus is kinda boring to play. I may go back to an infect version but I'm liking the direction this is going now. As for your counterspells suggestion, I need to decide if I'm going with cheap CMC counters or some of the bigger ones.

jpsuchecki So Skeleton Shard is a good idea - need to fig out what to replace. Buried Ruin will go in and replace another land - I also have Academy Ruins which is sweet, but more ways to pull from my graveyard gives me more of an excuse to run Codex Shredder ;) Command Tower - not sure how I didn't add that. And probably Command Beacon too since Vela isn't cheap to cast. Rhystic Study... I.. want to add it... but i always want to add it... but "didja pay yer 1?? didja pay yer 1??" really starts to annoy my local group ;)

Its probably best for you to just race your opponents for the win...fast mana is just better than the hate cards available. Other than that all you really have left is graveyard hate...and cards like Planar Void are really bad for you.

1 month ago

sonnet666 Thanks for looking at the deck and providing feedback!! I updated the description to explain the mana used to assemble the infinite combo. Responses to the rest of your feedback are as follows:

Nim Deathmantle gives intimidate. It's unlikely that all 3 opponents will have an artifact/black creature with which to block, so 14 damage (and thus 14 mana) can be fairly safely assumed on the combo turn barring creature/artifact removal or stax disruption.

Nim Deathmantles color-changing and type-changing effects override the equipped creatures previous colors and creature types. After Nim Deathmantle becomes equipped to a creature, that creature will be a black Zombie, not any other colors or creature types. Skirk Prospector cannot sac non-goblin zombies. Thermopod is too difficult to tutor with Heirloom Blade.

Argentum Armor comes down AND attaches itself to Godo for FREE. It can destroy 2 permanents per turn, which is a great plan B if stax pieces are hosing the Kiki combo, especially for extra turn wins. Please give additional feedback on why this shouldn't be included.

Dowsing Dagger
's primary purpose is to provide mana to cast Last Chance if we've tapped out to equip Blade of Selves. Sometimes we won't have the 2 mountains needed for Sword of Feast and Famine. Aggravated Assault does provide great synergy, but it's also very obviously threatening, hard to cast before Godo if we're running rituals, and hard to activate without
Dowsing Dagger
before turn 5.
Dowsing Dagger
can also be attached to smaller creatures to provide ramp. This deck needs 6 or 8 mana or more at once, not 4 mana in both main phases.

I'm open to swapping out Pyrokinesis, but it hits all the stax creatures we need for 0 mana, and surprises LabMan combos with a loss when we're tapped out. "Do you ever see it in cEDH" isn't the best argument for tuning a mono-red deck that's actively burning cards for gas.

Possibility Storm is in the Ruric Thar, the Unbowed deck on your list. While I understand it synergizes with Thar's ability, it doesn't affect our game plan in the slightest and creates a mess for most other decks. Do you think it's not powerful enough to warrant playing? I'm open to swapping it out, but it seems as debilitating as landing Blood Moon.

Winds of Change and Widespread Panic are in the deck to shuffle equipment back into our library where we want it. The deck goes off a turn or two slower if it ends up drawing Nim Deathmantle or any of the other combo piece of equipment we need. Winds of Change is in the Purphoros, God of the Forge deck on your list, which is the highest tier a mono-red deck is listed in. Widespread Panic is a flex spot, so I'd be open to cutting it if it underperforms, but it hoses top-deck tutors and generally punishes fetch-lands and tutoring in general. By the time we're tutoring with Godo we shouldn't need cards in hand.

Aven Mindcensor makes our deck useless. Abrade kills that. It kills opponents' creatures about to win them the game. It's in a lot of top tier decks. It fires at instant speed. It seems like the best artifact removal we can run.

Mogg Salvage is a flex spot. It's is in the deck because it can remove a stax piece for free on the combo turn (when we need gas) and occasionally ruin someone else's combo when we're tapped out. I could be swapped out.

Thorn of Amethyst could be cut. It's main purpose is to fight Counterspells and to slow people down.

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